Secrets of the Sandhills
A Nebraska Sandhills Novel
A Sandhills Carpenter
Walking four weeks in a Sandhiller's shoes
When a carpenter takes a job in the Sandhills it's a fair bet that it will involve a bit of windshield time. I'm finishing a house remodel that is located nearly two hundred miles from our home in Broken Bow. That sort of commute requires a duffle bag full of clean socks and shirts for some overnights at the jobsite. Darn, I have to go live in my beloved Sandhills.
Monday, January 22nd, I packed the Suburban with every necessary tool, including the dreaded plumber's box, and headed west on Highway 2. My destination was a ranch house on Highway 27, halfway between Ellsworth and Gordon. The job involved replacing two showers and a kitchen floor. As in any home remodel, I was prepared for the worst, or so I thought.
We call this place the "Guide House." It's the house where all the hunting guides stay who work for Deer Meadows Outfitters. Last fall we noticed the familiar odor of skunk when we walked in the door. The smell hadn't improved by January. When I removed the lid to crawl under the house, the same odor came wafting out. I slowly swung the beam of my flashlight into the dark recesses of the crawl space, searching for beady eyes and white stripes. Thankfully, all I found was a big, yellow cat. I figured that a cat and a skunk wouldn't cohabit the space.
The guide house is a 1980 model factory-built home like I so despise working on. Every time that I work on one I say "never again." Every time I work on plumbing I say "never again." Here I was, plumbing in a factory-built house. The only thing that made me say "yes" to this job was the fact that I live in this house every rifle season, and the fact that it sits in the middle of the gnarliest of hills.
I found all sorts of unpleasant surprises as I ripped out the old tub. The drain pipe ran above the floor into the bedroom closest which forced me to cut out several floor joists and header them for strength. This had to be accomplished on my back in the crawl space, laying in newly deposited cat poop. I wasn't sure which smelled worse, skunks or cats.
Next, I pulled up the vinyl plank flooring to expose water soaked plywood, originating from the toilet. This would all need replaced.
The nearest Menards store was in Scotts Bluff, two hours south and west. I made a list of supplies and jumped into the Suburban for the drive, only to discover another smell. The big yellow tom cat had jumped in the open back hatch and marked multiple spots. I dumped urine off the the floor mats, rinsed them off under a hydrant, and propped them against the fence to air in the sun. I drove the first forty miles with the windows down in the January air, streaming cat scent down the highway.
Other than the smell, the drive to Scotts Bluff was quite pleasurable. I spotted Chimney Rock to the south and I have never seen a prettier view from a Menards parking lot.
I purchased a new shower and all the plumbing and wood to install it, and fueled up to make the two hour journey back to Scott and Emma's in time for supper. Getting supplies is serious business when you live in the Sandhills.
Scott and Emma Kuhn are long time friends and graciously hosted my stay in Sheridan County. Scott operates Deer Meadows Outfitters and coaches the Cody Kilgore boys basketball team, making the daily eighty-six mile drive to Cody. His 5:30 a.m. practices require him to leave pretty much in the middle of the night. Emma is an all-around cowgirl that cooks like a gourmet. I put on several pounds during my visit. Steph Kuhn is another cowgirl and part time brand inspector who lives next door. We enjoyed her home-grown beef for many of the meals. Also, living amongst them, are an assortment of cow dogs.
Aggie
Back at the guide house I ran into another problem. Half the electrical circuits were blinking on and off for some reason. Sometimes they would stay off for an hour or more. I was having enough troubles before losing lights so I paused the plumbing job and started tracing the outage. Luckily, I had a voltage tester with me and found the problem in a breaker panel under the meter box on the power pole in the back yard. A spade lug was corroded and a few swipes with a file fixed the problem.
I managed to finish the floor framing and plumb the drain by Thursday so I loaded up the car and headed home, hoping to get a little fishing done at Avocet Lake on the way. I only had enough daylight left to walk to the middle of the lake and drill two holes and catch two little perch as the full moon was rising in the east.
On Sunday, I picked up a shower door and some plywood at Menards in Kearney for the trip back on Monday. I spent the second week taking out the wet floor and replacing it with treated plywood. I also framed the two ends walls to fit the new shower. Factory-built houses don't use standard size tubs so I had to retrofit the new shower.
Week three I picked up some trim and flooring in Kearney to finish the main bathroom. I also made a trip into Gordon to purchase a new toilet to replace the old leaking one that had cracks across the bottom of the tank. Before I left on Thursday I tore up the kitchen floor to discover the same problem. A leak had soaked the plywood underneath and it was wafering up like a potato chip. I needed to make another trip to Menards for kitchen plywood and flooring, plus another shower for the master bathroom.
Main bathroom with the new flooring nearly finished.
This week I tore up the kitchen floor plywood underlayment and replaced it with new 3/4 OSB tongue and groove sheets. Amazingly, the skunky smell disappeared with the old, wet plywood. I installed the new plank flooring and trim to finish the kitchen. Before I left in the snowstorm on Thursday, I plumbed in the supply lines for the new shower in the master bath. I will finish the job when the special order shower door comes in at Menards.
Looking back at the last four weeks, I reflect on things that I learned about the Sandhills and the people that live there. For one, there is no such thing as a low-mileage vehicle in this area. A simple trip to the grocery store means putting on between fifty and a hundred miles. Kids can commute over a hundred miles each day for school.
People who live out here need to be a jack-of-all-trades. There isn't a plumber a few blocks away to repair a leaky toilet. When the lights start blinking they have to find the problem and fix it. When the county road becomes impassable, they blaze a new road cross country. I spied a minivan driving across a meadow to get to the highway one day. It's a no-nonsense, non-conforming, neighbor helping way of life that appeals to me. It's a place where the rest of the world can go somewhere in a hand basket and it will still be there, quietly watching the sunsets.
